As we say farewell to the 2023-24 NHL season–which was a big one for hockey cards– there was a special anniversary that slipped under the radar.
This season marked the 100th anniversary of one of the most important sets in hockey card history. The V-145-1 set, more commonly known as the William Paterson Chocolates set.
Issued with candy bars, the 1923-24 set featured stars of the NHL. At that time, the NHL was small and regional. There were just four teams in the league – the Montreal Canadiens, the Ottawa Senators, the Hamilton Tigers, and the Toronto St. Pats, who would later become the Toronto Maple Leafs.
The 40-card set featured black and white photos of the top stars from the four teams. More importantly, it featured the cards of the league’s star rookie from that year and one of the greatest hockey players who ever lived, Howie Morenz.
Morenz was born in Mitchell, Ontario, which is about a 45-minute drive from London, Ontario. His family moved to nearby Stratford when he was a teenager.
That year, in 1917, Morenz tried to enlist in the Canadian military to serve in World War I. He was refused entry when they learned he was only 15 years old.
Morenz began playing minor hockey in Mitchell and then continued playing in Stratford. He often played in goal but because of his speed, he ended up playing forward. He led Stratford’s U20 team to the Memorial Cup as Ontario champions, but they lost to the Winnipeg Falcons.
While apprenticing with the Canadian National Railway (CNR) the following year, Morenz played in a tournament and scored nine goals in a game. The referee of the game contacted Montreal Canadiens owner Leo Dandurand, who sent coach Cecil Hart to Stratford to talk to him and sign him to a contract. In July 1923, Morenz was signed to what was then a lucrative deal for three years at $3,500 per year plus a signing bonus of $1,000.
People in Stratford were upset that he signed with the Canadiens and urged him to stay and play senior hockey. He wrote a letter to Dandurand and returned his signing bonus.
After receiving the letter, Dandurand contacted Morenz by telephone and told him that he wanted to talk to him in person. Morenz went to Montreal to meet with Canadiens owner, he started crying as he explained that he did not want to leave Stratford. Dandurand told Morenz that if he did not join the Canadiens, his professional hockey career would be over. Morenz believed the lie and agreed to come to training camp.
Immediate Impact
In his first NHL game on Dec. 26, 1923, Morenz scored his first goal in a game at the Ottawa Auditorium. The Senators won 3-2 in overtime, but Morenz had arrived. He finished with 13 goals and three assists for 16 points. It was good enough for a tie for seventh in the 24-game season. Ottawa’s Cy Denneny had 22 goals and two assists for 24 points to win the scoring title.
The Hart Trophy was introduced in 1923-24 for the NHL MVP, and it was won by Ottawa’s Frank Nighbor. The trophy was donated by Dr. David Hart, the father of the Montreal coach and GM Cecil Hart who originally signed Morenz.
To win the Stanley Cup, the Canadiens had to beat two teams from Western Canada. The Cup was not automatically given to the NHL champion yet. The Canadiens won a pair of best-of-three series. They swept the Pacific Coast Hockey Association champion Vancouver Maroons and then won the Cup by sweeping the Western Canada Hockey League champion Calgary Tigers. Morenz had a hat trick in the first game and then added another goal in the second game.
Loaded With Rookies
The 1923-24 Paterson set is loaded with rookies of the four NHL teams.
Aside from Morenz, the other Montreal rookies in the set include Aurel Joliat (uncorrected error card), Sylvio Mantha, Billy Boucher and Billy Coutu, who remains the only player in NHL history banned for life. Among the other Montreal big names are Joe Malone, brothers Odie and Sprague Cleghorn, and goalie Georges Vezina.
There are six Ottawa Senators rookie cards in the set, including stars Frank Nighbor, Frank “King” Clancy and Cy Denneny (uncorrected error), along with Harry Helman, Georges Boucher and Lionel Hitchman. Also in the set from the Senators are some big names like Eddie Gerard, Jack Darragh, Clint Benadict and Harry Broadbent.
All nine of the Toronto St. Pat’s cards are rookie cards. They are Amos Arbour, Lloyd Andrews, Willaim “Red” Stuart, Cecil “Babe” Dye, Jack Adams, Bert Corbeau, Reginald Noble and John Ross Roach.
Hamilton has 12 cards in the set and all but Goldie Prodgers are rookie cards. They are Vernon Forbes, Shorty Green, Red Green, Leo Reise, Ken Randall, Billy Burch, Jesse Spring, Eddie Bouchard, Mickey Roach, Charles Fraser and Corbett Denneny (uncorrected error).
Rising Star
While Wayne Gretzky is often credited for growing the game in the last generation, the same could be said for Morenz in his day.
Boston businessman Charles Adams went to the Stanley Cup Finals between Montreal and Calgary and was so impressed with Morenz that he applied to the NHL for an expansion team. The Bruins began play the next year. The following year, New York boxing promoter and Madison Square Garden owner Tex Rickard, also drawn to the game by Morenz, put ice in his arena and got an NHL team. He called the team the New York Americans, and one of the stipulations of the new team was that their first game would be at home against the Canadiens so that fans could see Morenz.
The following year, Rickard got a second team. The media began calling the team Tex’s Rangers, which is how the New York Rangers got their name.
In 1924, a reporter in New York asked Rickard what the ‘H’ stood for in Montreal’s logo. He told the reporter it stood for “Habitants,” which in reality was an insulting term that translated to “redneck”. The media started calling the Canadiens the Habs, and the nickname stuck, thanks to Rickard. The C and H in the logo, by the way, stands for Club de Hockey Canadiens.
Morenz emerged as the Canadiens’ biggest star through the 1920s. He had 27 goals and 12 assists for 39 points in 30 games in 1924-25, though the Canadiens did not win the Stanley Cup.
In the 1927-28 season, Morenz became the first player in NHL history to record 50 points in a season. He won his first of three Hart Trophies that season.
The Canadiens won the Stanly Cup in 1930 and 1931with Morenz totaling 50 and 51 points in the two seasons. Over the next two seasons, Morenz would become the NHL’s all-time points and goal scoring leader.
Injuries took their toll on Morenz during the 1933-34 season. Before the start of the 1934-35 season, he was traded to the Chicago Black Hawks. Midway through the following season he was traded to the New York Rangers.
The Canadiens hired Cecil Hart to come back as their head coach for the 1936-37 season, and he agreed to come back only if the Canadiens signed Morenz. They bought Morenz’s contract from the Rangers, and Morenz was back in Montreal.
Morenz was having a good year, with four goals and 16 assists for 20 points through 30 games. On January 28, Morenz suffered a career-ending injury as he broke his leg in four places. Morenz was hospitalized in Montreal and never made it out of the hospital. He suffered a coronary embolism March 8, 1934 and died at the age of 34.
All-Star Game and Legacy
The first NHL All-Star Game was played in 1934 as a benefit for Ace Bailey. While playing for the Toronto Maple Leafs, Bailey’s career was ended when he was rushed from behind by Eddie Shore and hit his head on the ice, fracturing his skull. Bailey’s career was over, and the All-Star Game was a benefit for him and his family. Bailey was also the first player in pro sports to have his number retired, as the Leafs retired his number 6.
The second NHL All-Star Game ever played was a benefit for the family of Howie Morenz. His funeral drew more than 50,000 and was held at the Montreal Forum.
Morenz’s daughter, Marlee, married Bernie “Boom Boom” Geoffrion, who starred for the Canadiens and then the Rangers. Their son, Blake Geoffrion, played in the NHL for the Nashville Predators and the Candiens, making him a third generation Montreal Canadiens player.
Morenz finished his career with 271 goals and 201 assists for 472 points in 550 NHL games.
While Morenz has nearly 800 cards including variations, he did not have many cards issued during his career.
The William Paterson 1923-24 RC is his first, and he was also included in the 1924-25 William Paterson set the following year, although the cards are almost identical and use the same photo.
Morenz had two other cards in 1924-25. One is in the Maple Crispette set, which is a 30-card set though the Sprague Cleghorn card is an extremely rare shortprint. The other is in the Champ’s Cigarettes set, which featured 1.5” by 2.5” cards with sepia-tone coloring.
Two of the most intriguing Morenz cards appeared in the 1925-26 and 1926-27 sets simply known in the hobby as Anonymous. The Morenz cards use the same photo in both sets, though in the 1926-27 set his name is misspelled (Morentz) on the card front. There are a number of variations of this set circulating, as some have borders and some have no border. There are also some cards with numbering that is not consistent with the most common checklists of the set.
In 1927-28, there are two sets of photos that have been popular among vintage collectors. La Patrie and La Presse, two French language newspapers in Montreal, issued a series of photos that were printed in the papers. La Patrie photos are 8.5” by 11”, while the La Press photos are larger at 10” by 16.5”. The La Patrie photos are black and white, while the La Presse photos were colored by hand on the negative. A century ago, printing in color was an extremely difficult and delicate task, which makes this set special.
La Presse continued the photo promotion through 1931-32, but the first set was the only one with Morenz.
The only other color images of Morenz on a collectible issued during his career is his 1933 Sport Kings card.
The 48-card multi-sport set had cards 2.375” by 2.875” and were issued in color. Like the La Presse photos, they were hand colored black and white photos. Morenz was one of four hockey players featured in the set. The others were Eddie Shore, Ace Bailey and Ching Johnson.
The 1933-34 season saw a multitude of hockey cards and collectibles hit the market. Morenz is featured on cards by British Consoles, Hamilton Gum (four variations with different color backgrounds), O-Pee-Chee (four different color background variations), World Wide Gum (English and bilingual back variations). There was also a Diamond matchbook series with NHL players on matchbooks, and Morenz is included in that set.
Morenz was also available in the BeeHive photos program that began as a mail-in offer from St. Lawrnece Starch in BeeHive Golden Corn Syrup. BeeHive’s main rival on the market was Crown Brand Corn Syrup, produced by Canada Starch. They produced photos from 1935-40, and Morenz is included in their set.
In 1934-35, Sweet Caporal issued a set of cards and it was the first card of Morenz in a Chicago uniform.
Morenz was back in a Montreal uniform for his 1936-37 O-Pee-Chee die-cut card, which is very condition sensitive on the market. The last Morenz card of that era is the 1937-38 World Wide Gum card.
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